Should You Confront an Alcoholic (or addict) About their Lies?

Should you confront an addict or an alcoholic about the lies that they're trying to tell you? That's what we're going to talk about in this video. Plus even more for those of you who are new here, I'm Amber Hollingsworth and this YouTube channel is called Put the Shovel Down. And the whole goal of this channel is to help you get your life and your family back on track from addiction so you can get back out there and live the life that you want to live. If that sounds like something you're interested in, consider subscribing, because that's what we do here on this channel. Let's get into our topic today. Should I confront someone who has an addiction about their lying? I get asked this all the time. And the answer to it is, it depends. Don't worry, I'm not just going to leave it at that like some counselory type answer. I know that's frustrating. I'm going explain to you the thought process, kind of almost like a little formula or thinking scheme that you can go through to make a decisions on. On if you should confront, when to confront, and if you're going to do it, how to do it. So what's up? We'll be covering all those topics in this video. If you're excited to hear about this and it's something that you really need to know about, give me a thumbs up in the chat or comments. All right, here we go. The first part of the formula for deciding whether or not to confront someone about their addiction is for you to decide. Ask yourself this. Why do you want to confront them? Okay, this, and this is hard because it's going to require some serious self honesty. Okay? You really got to be honest with yourself. Why do I want to confront them? Do I want to confront them because my pride is hurt, you know, is it an ego thing where they keep trying to tell me I'm crazy and I know I'm not and I'm gonna confront them with the evidence and I'm gonna prove I'm not crazy like they're saying I am. If that's what's going on, then you're probably trying to confront for a pride reason and probably not the best reason to do so. We'll come back to why in just a second are you trying to confront them to just validate yourself? And that's similar to the other one. But it's just like I want you to know that I'm right and you're wrong. Is that why you're trying to confront? If that's why you're trying to confront, or you're thinking about it. Probably not a good reason. Again, we'll talk about why in just a minute. Are you trying to confront them because you want them to know that they can't fool you, or are you trying to confront them because you want them to realize that they have an addiction problem and they need to own up to it and they need to do something about it? These are the big categories of why you may be thinking about confronting someone. First and foremost, I hope that you're at least stopping to think about whether to confront it before you confront it. Because I know when you find the piece of evidence or someone lies to you right to your face, and it's so obvious, it's just ridiculous. And you want to be like, seriously, you can have that emotional reaction to just want to call it out immediately. And so you never want to do it impulsively or in the heat of a moment, or if the other person is really intoxicated on a substance, you don't want to do it. At least. At least you don't want to do it at those times. Okay, so hopefully you're stopping to think about, do I want to confront it? Right. And if you can stop and think about that, those questions I just went over, that's what I want you to ask yourself. Am I doing this because of my pride? Am I doing this because I want you to know I know and you're wrong? Am I doing this because I want you to realize you have a problem? The thing of it is, none of those reasons. If the answer to any of those questions is yes, those are actually kind of bad reasons to do it. Here's why. If you're trying to do it because you're trying to prove something to yourself or to them, and it's sort of a pride thing that's getting in your way. It probably isn't going to make you feel better. Because if you're confronting them and trying to make them admit you're right and they're wrong most of the time, okay, maybe not all the time, but like, probably like 90 of the time, maybe even like 95 of the time, you're not going to get something. You're not going to get a response from them that's going to make you feel better in the end. What's going to happen is they're going to do one of two things. They're going to either continue to deny it and then back up their denial with gaslighting to make you Think you're crazy. And so you're going to leave that conversation questioning your own sanity even more than when you went into it. Or they're going to derail the conversation by doing something like starting an argument with you or bringing up your flaws or the things you've done in the past, or calling you controlling, nagging, a paranoid lunatic or something like that. Right? The conversation probably isn't going to go well. So if you're trying to do it for your own pride or you're trying to do it because you're trying to make them see the truth is probably not going to work. Right? And a lot of people ask me, well, if I don't call it out and I don't confront them, am I not enabling them? No, you're not enabling them, okay? If you're. If you're not doing it just because you're scared all the time and you don't want to upset them and you just don't want to just for the purpose of you're trying to just keep their life beautiful and peaceful, that might be enabling, but making a strategic decision to decide to yourself. Like, I don't want to start a fight about this because I got a bigger game plan, which we're going to move to in number two, second one here, that's a strategic decision. So to my mind, that's not enabling. That's. That's making a choice about which battles to fight and not fight. You're not ignoring the problem across the board. You're deciding how to best deal with the problem. Which sort of brings me to number two, the big thing. I want you to really. If you take nothing away from this video, this is the thing, okay? I want you to shift your focus from trying to prove that they're lying to you, and I want you to shift it over to. To trying to get them to see that they're lying to themselves or that they. Basically, what I'm saying is you want to focus on getting them to see the problem, not getting them to see that you're right. Not getting them to see that you know they're lying and they can't fool you, none of that stuff. Because when you do that, you're. You're engaging in a power struggle, right? And when we do that, we engage in that power struggle. A lot of times it's kind of like we missed the forest for the trees. We win the battle, but we lose the war. And you guys know on this channel, we want to win this war. That's what I'm here to tell you this channel is about keeping you five steps ahead of addiction. And if you engage in every single little stupid argument or stupid thing, you're not five steps ahead. You're right in the moment, and you're fighting every little battle as they happen, we're going to be better than that. We're soldiers. We know what we're doing, and we're going to get five steps ahead of this one little lie right here. If it's a safety issue that's being lied about, that's different. Y' all know we got videos on that. But if it's just some stupid lie, like, did you have drinks with your friend at a bar? And they said, yeah, I had two, but you know, they had six. What. What difference does it make? Doesn't. It doesn't. Right. And so when you engage in an argument about that and you try to confront that and you try to say, well, I saw the bill or I saw the bank statement, and it said you. You spend $45. So I'm thinking you have more than two feet or something, you could do that, right? But. But you're not going to win the war doing that. And what you really do when you do that is you cause argument. Well, okay, I'm not going to make it your fault, this argument, but what I'm saying is you engage in a power struggle, right? And what we want the person to do is we want them to see they have a problem because we want them to get better. And so you may be asking yourself, well, if you don't call them out about their stuff, how do you make them see that they have a problem? The good news is this. The good news is, most of the time, if we just let it, the universe does its work. Universe will tell them that they have a problem. And as long as you're not standing there distracting and throwing fits and having power struggles, they'll get that message faster, louder and clearer than when you're trying to force them to see it. The more you try to force them, the. The longer it's going to take to see it. I know I told y' all this last week. I'm going to tell it to you again. It happens more and more often. I can tell when I get a new client in my office, if their family's been watching my videos. I can tell I can do client office if their family has been doing our online program, invisible Intervention, Because I'm telling you, when they come into my office, they come in talking to me about the problem. Guess what they come and talk to me about when the family's not doing this. The family. This week I had a couple new clients, and I was treatment teaming with one of our family counselors, Campbell. I was treatment team with her about this new client I got. And. And she was saying, well, what did they. You know, what did they say about their wife? Is there things I need to work on with the wife? I said, you know what? Be honest. Tell me anything about their wife. But you know what that means? It's good news, because that means they're not focused on the wife being the problem. They came straight in the office, told me, I'm drinking too much. This is the problem. I don't want to be like this. Hurt my family, hurt my kids. Like, I never thought I'd be this person, this ridiculous. I want to stop because this person's wife had made the decision not to fight about every little thing along the way. And once. Once the wife made that decision, it didn't happen, like, immediately. But over the next few months, the person starts to see the problem for themselves more and more and more clearly. And then they. They end up in my office, and they're ready to go. And maybe I just love it because it makes my job so much easier. And the ones that fight and confront every single little thing. I'm telling you, it's months of sitting in my office. I say, why are you here? And they say, I got a marriage problem. And they focus. I can't talk about anything else but the marriage problem. Right? So if it's a safety issue, there. There are some reasons sometimes why you. Why you want to confront something. Let's say your loved one, you know, they've been drinking, and they're about to get in the car, and they're about to drive down the road with your kids. Okay? That's a situation that's a little different, right? That. That's not. We're not. You don't want to engage in a power struggle. Just engage in a power struggle just so they know you're right and they can't fool you. Who cares, right? Because they're not really fooling you. Just because you don't call a lie out does not mean you're letting them fool you. You five steps ahead of them, you can let them think they win and you winning on this one little manipulation thing or something, because you really have steps down the road, right? You're like, I don't care about this one thing. I'm gonna win this war, so don't worry about that. But if it's a safety issue or there's some other times when you might want to call it out. And maybe sometimes some of us, I mean, sometimes we just, we just gotta say it. Got sometimes just gotta say it, even in session. Sometimes I call it out. A lot of times I don't call out when I know someone's lying, which is a lot. Luckily, in our office, we, we tend to see the family too. So I usually know what's gonna happen before they ever come in. But I don't have to call out every bit of it. I just don't. Because it's not necessary. But if you are going to come call it out because maybe safety, reason, or maybe you just need to say it because you just got to say it this time I want to give you some, a little bit advice on how to do that, okay? Because there's some ways, if you're going to do it, that's more effective. First thing I want to tell you about this is I don't want you to ask the question, did you do this? Have you been doing this? Don't ask the question. Just make the statement. Hey, I know you've been drinking. Hey, I know you had five or six beers with Johnny at the bar. Don't, don't ask. Because if you ask, the person is going to reflexively lie to you. It is, it's like a. I'm not saying it's right. I'm not saying it's okay. I'm just saying it's an instinct, a protective mechanism. They're going, they're just going to be like, no. I've had so many people, especially alcoholics, come in. They say, I promise you, if someone asked me if I've been drinking, I don't care if I'm crawling, I can't walk. I will say, no, I haven't been drinking. And then like the next day if they ask me, I'll own it. But for whatever reason, if they ask me that moment, I'm just gonna lie. It's like a reflex. No, it's like in my mind, it's like a little kid with like their hands behind their back and they're like. And you're like, what do you got behind your back? And they're like, nothing. It's just immediate, right? So don't ask the question, just make the statement. And when you make the statement, I want you to say it casually. Because if you say it with a lot of emotional tone in your voice, that immediately hits the emotional center of their brain and immediately throws up the defenses. I like to say, like you can say almost anything you want to say someone if you just say it the right way. Right? So say it in a casual tone and say it quickly and then move on. Don't make a huge, we gotta talk about this thing. Don't try to engage in a long conversation after you say it. And make them admit is so much better if you literally just say it and walk out the room. Because then they're gonna absorb it and then they're gonna think about how to respond to you. And you want to give them a little time to think about how to respond to you. Because if they have to immediately respond to you, they're gonna tell you a lie. They're gonna deflate the conversation, they're gonna start an argument or something. Not helpful, right? Just say, hey, I know you had them six beers with Johnny at the bar, let's talk about it tomorrow, or something like that. Give them time to think it through. If you put people on the spot, they're just going to naturally, you know, be defensive because they don't have enough time to think. And if you give them time to think, you're. You're more likely to get a more reasonable response out of them. Okay? And you can say, hey, I'm not mad, not upset. Just want you to know that I know, be casual and walk on. Just leave the room if possible. Now, if you struggle with knowing how to deal with manipulation tactics, like you're afraid when you do have that conversation that they're going to pull some kind of manipulation tactic on you. I did put the link in the description because I always try to give you guys tons of resources. I put the link in the description for our. It's like a quick guide on manipulation tactics and it kind of goes through the different tactics as if you see this, this, if you see this, do this. So I put the link, you can get that free download if you want. Because when you do have that conversation, you may want to walk into it prepared, which is another kind of like really good reason to. To say it and move on is because it gives you time to really think about how you want to really address this situation. Because you gotta, you gotta remember here the big goal is to get them to see the big problem, not to make sure that they know that you know. They already know that you know. And there are other ways of telling them that you know, without having to confront every little thing. So if you can wait to do it and they're not intoxicated and it's a better time or place to do it, that's always a better idea. If you can do it casually, that's always a better idea. Occasionally, you know. Well, not occasionally. In my office, I have to make decisions a hundred times a day when I'm seeing clients about whether or not to call out something I know is not true or let it be. 75% of the time, I probably let it be. And I find another way to bring it around. Occasionally I know someone is not telling me something that they really need to tell me or that really has to be talked about, usually because I need to help them get themselves out of a hole on it or something. Then I might say, just so you know, I got a call from you mama before you got here. And here's what she told me. Don't be mad. And I say I'm not upset. Probably not even true, which is another skill. Forgot to say that. Don't know why I put it in my notes, but I forgot to tell you all that if you do call it out, leave, say it in such a way that you, like, leave room, that you're wrong. It's really smart and one easy way you can do this. It makes me think, I don't know if you guys know who Brene Brown is. She's like the famous lady from the TED Talk, and she talks about vulnerability. She's got all those really great books. We love her. Anyways, she uses this sort of line or statement, the story I'm telling myself, which I think is a really great way of leaving room. That maybe you're wrong. Right? Because chances are you probably know in general the deal, but you don't know every single detail of the deal. And. And when you say the story I'm telling myself is, is that you actually left early from work and you stopped at the pizza place, you brought us some of those pizzas, which were great, kids loved it, but that you had three beers when you did it or that you gave me your paycheck. Story I'm telling myself is, you gave me your paycheck, but you didn't tell me that you got paid for that side job you did last week and that you went and bought drugs with it. I could totally be wrong, probably paranoid, crazy, lunatic. But that's the story I'm telling myself. So another thing you can say is I could be wrong. Probably wrong, hope I'm wrong, hope I'm wrong. Or you can say it's probably not even the way it happened. At all. That's just what I heard right. You know, people, they don't say it right. Leave room that you're wrong. Because when you do that, you're going into it with humility. And it's. It's a lot less likely to throw them into a power struggle because what you're saying is, hey, I'm not. This is not a weapon. When you say, like, I could be wrong, like, you literally, like, a lot of times I like you throw your hands up when I do. I say, I could be wrong, throw my hands up. It's almost like showing I don't have any weapons. This is not a fight. We're all good here, right? So leave room that you could be wrong. Hey, because you could be wrong. Don't try to be like, I know you did that, and I know it was, you know, six white claws that you drank with your girlfriends the other night or whatever, because you're probably wrong about part of it. And this is one of the manipulation tactics I talk about in our. In our manipulation series, which I'll link up here for you at the end. But one of them is, is they'll let you talk until you say one thing wrong, and it's a stupid detail that doesn't even matter to the whole conversation. They will derail you with that one little detail. They'll be like, no, I wasn't with Mary. I was with Jill. Why do you always think I'm a Mary? You always blame her for everything. You know, it's not Mary that does this. You just paranoid or whatever, and now all of a sudden y' all arguing about Mary. It's ridiculous, right? So leave room to be wrong. Don't get into the details. You know, the numbers, the people, the brand, the exact dollar amount. Don't get into any of that because it doesn't matter, right? And chances are, if you try to give that many details, you're going to say something wrong, and then they're going to catch you saying something wrong, and they're going to argue with you about that, and they're going to make you feel stupid and make you feel like you don't know what you're talking about. And then before you know it, you arguing about the dumb thing that don't even matter and you let them derail you. So don't. Don't do that. Let's see who's with us today. Let's see about you guys experience with this. If you're joining us on the replay. Definitely join the conversation. I go back and read every single comment. And I respond to most all of them. All right, let's see who we got with us. Hey, Anthony, I see you're on here with us. And I see catus and ingle, wing eagle, winged turtle, and M8DEB. WM, we got lots of people. AJ, let's see what you guys have to say about this. WM says, my wife says she doesn't have a drinking problem. Okay, that's a good one, right? Because that's not a lie, like, about a specific thing, like I didn't have two drinks while you weren't looking. That we like a specific lie. This is just saying it's a denial of the problem in general. And what you want to do is you want to get at that issue. And the way you get that issue is you don't argue with someone about whether or not they have a drinking problem. You don't say, well, last week you drank a bottle of vodka and three bottles of wine or whatever. You know, you don't. Don't get into the details of it. You want to focus on letting them see it. And if you're not sure how to do that, wm, check out my playlist called how to Get Someone out of Denial. And there's another playlist called how to Get Someone to Take Steps Toward Recovery. Either one of those. And that'll kind of give you the step by step process. If you want the. The real course on it, then check out our invisible intervention. That may be helpful. But there's a process for how do you get someone out of denial? And I can promise you the process is not arguing with them. That's the least effective way to get someone out of denial. Worst way possible. I was talking to a friend. Not a friend of mine. Sorry. I was talking to a client of mine who was telling me about a friend of his this week. And this, this client's been doing really well for like a long time, more than a year. Something about a friend of his who had a drinking problem and the friend of his did something while intoxicated. That was videotaped. It was on video. Like, a lot of people saw it. And even when the friends and everybody confronted him with the videotape, it didn't work. I mean, it's clear right there on video. You heard it, saw it, everybody heard it and saw it, and it still didn't work because they're trying to call him out and they're trying to put him on the spot, and they're trying to tell him he's ruining his life. And so even when you have that amount of evidence, it doesn't work to try and back someone into a corner. There are ways to do it, but that's not the way way to do it. Hey, Steven. Michelle says fiance walked out April 6th after I found crap in his pocket. No clue where he is daily and night. Connects with people that use and sell. Text me two times for money. Other than that, I don't exist. Why? The answer to that, Michelle, is because you're dealing with somebody has an addiction problem. And this addiction problem inside this person is running the show completely at this point, right? And. And it's just easier. And so, I mean, it's to this point now, I mean, it. They're not even trying to argue with you about it, really. They're just using it as an excuse to walk out the door, leave, and go do what they want to do. That's called the starting an argument. Manipulation. If you look at the manipulation series, right? And it takes a lot of nerve, I. I know you got to be frustrated, Michelle. It takes a lot of nerve to walk out, leave, don't even communicate with you. But te for money. You gotta be like, no, you didn't. At least that's what I would be like. Not cool, right? Ag says, can't wait. My alcoholic conveniently forgets things he's done. He blames them on someone else. It's got to be about my healing now. No more trauma from his gaslighting. One thing I will say to you, Ag, is if the problem is alcohol, they probably are really forgetting because probably the things they say and do, a lot of those things are saying and doing are done during a blackout. So it's possible that they're conveniently forgetting, but it's quite possible that they literally don't remember. And then when confronted, they do blame things on outside people and situations because partly because they don't remember and partly because they're defensive and backed into a corner. And that's, that's a lot of times what people do when they feel that way. That being said, that's not me telling you to stay in a bad situation. That's just me telling you if it's alcohol, it's quite possible that they don't remember. It's why one of the reasons why alcoholic denial is a little different than some of the other substance abuse kind of denial. And I do have a playlist on the channel specifically about alcohol if you want to look at that. See. Hey, Kit says I have been calling him out and denial. Denial. Denial makes me crazy. Exactly. Stop calling them out. So, yeah, literally, even when they know that, you know, they're just gonna be. They're just gonna deny it to the end. I'm telling you. Let's see here. Debbie says to make them stop lying and just get real. The thing of it is, is you can't make them stop lying, and you can't make them get real, but you can back out of the way and let the situation get real. Let the real world communicate to them that they have a problem. And it will. It won't do it as fast as you want them to do as fast as you want it to do it. Like, they won't get arrested as fast as you want them to. They won't lose their job as fast as you want them to. They won't fill their classes as fast or get suspended. It'll take longer than you want it to. Because for good or for bad, this world we live in, we like to give people a lot of chances. Sometimes it's great, and sometimes it's not great. So it'll take longer than you think and hope. But it will happen. Because addiction, the whole, like, definition of it, I mean, the whole idea is, like, it makes your life unmanageable, and that unmanageability will creep in. Some substances will make it creep in faster than others, but it will happen regardless if it's addiction, it will happen. Let's see here. Silent Sister says, is the said substance abuse creating disruptions in everyone's lives. Then all parties should respectfully bring the demons to the table for coffee. That's kind of funny. All parties should bring the demons to table for coffee. Okay, I can see that in my mind. I'm almost, like, picturing it. And because maybe because I'm from the. The South. Silent Sister, in my mind, it would be like bringing the enemy to the table. This probably my Southernness and telling coming out and be like, real nice and smile to it. Like, I'm not gonna fight with you about it, but I'm gonna win in my way because that's the way Southerners do. That's not always good either, but that's. If I was going to bring the demons for coffee, I'd let them sit down, let them get comfortable, and I'd be five steps ahead. You do not want to argue with the demon. You won't win. Let's see. One of our Facebook viewers says, I know he drank yesterday. He tried to hide it. I said nothing, but left him dealing with his overly Affectionate behavior. And I realize he has been drinking and driving. Yes, it's funny. Is overly affectionate behavior. Is that his tail? Is it kind of like after he's done something bad, he tries to be super nice? Is that the tail for you or for your loved one? Let's see. Deb Thomas says lying is a betrayal, and not confronting it becomes a form of self betrayal. It came to the point where I had to choose myself or choose his addiction. I chose myself. Yes. You gotta. In. In a lot of ways, Deb is right. I'm not telling you to ignore something long term. I'm not telling you to deny to yourself that there's a problem because that. That is a form of self betrayal. And Deb is right. I'm telling you to make strategic decisions about what to call out and when so that you can get five steps ahead of it so you can win the war. You're not. You're not trying to convince yourself that it's not happening. That means they can't lie to you. I mean, they can try. They can put the words out of their mouth, but if you don't believe it, you don't believe it. So they can't. You. They can't make you believe something. So don't worry about is true. That you got to be honest with yourself. Deb is right about that, and that is good advice. If you're denying it, denying it, denying it to yourself, that's a whole different thing that's going on. That's your denial. Eagle wing says, I've confronted my dad on multiple occasions. Sometimes it went better than others. Yeah, it's a Russian roulette. And sometimes that depends on personality, too. There are some people it will never go well with. Y' all know who I'm talking about. And there are some people it might go well. But here's the thing. Even if the conversation goes well, like, they don't scream or fight or throw fit or manipulate you, they're probably defensive in their head. So at the bare minimum, even if they're polite in the conversation, they're probably giving you, like, the Charlie Brown treatment, like, womp, womp, womp. So it's. Even if they're nice about it, it may not be making you headway if it looks like it. Especially if you've done it like 10 times and they keep doing it. But they're, like, nice. When you say something about it, they keep doing it anyway. They may be polite in their interaction, but it's not working. All right, here we go. Confession. I was a nightly drinker from 2017 to 2019, and I was with a guy who was traumatized by his mom's drinking throughout his childhood. I know I totally gaslit him every time he confronted me. I appreciate your confession. Thank you. I feel validated. Right. I appreciate that. Right. Because when we're confronted, it makes us feel defensive. Right. And we. We want to get out of it somehow. And gaslighting is one of the ways that we do that. I want my son to see he has a problem because I want him to be happy and his life to be better. There you go. And I want you to keep your focus on that. That is the war if we want to win the war. Right. And we can't fight every battle if we want to win the war. Find the important ones and deal with those, but deal with them strategically, not impulsively, and not emotionally. Let's see here. Silent sister says, doesn't that create passive aggression when nothing is said at all? Do you mean like on the person with the addictions part passive aggressiveness, or do you mean like on the family member, friend, loved ones part? If you're not saying something about it, but you're behaving passive aggressively about it, then it does create pass aggressive. Like, you're huffing and you're puffing and you're slamming things around and you're giving them a silent treatment. That's not what I'm talking about. Because silent sister's right. That's not strategy. That's passive aggressiveness. And whether you're calling it out or not, you still. You're showing out. You're starting to fight even if you do that. I'm glad you said that. Right. Because maybe some people try to say, oh, I did what you said, Amber. Like, I didn't say anything. But they basically gave the person the silent treatment, put them on some kind of punishment. I'm like, no, that doesn't count. That's not what I'm talking about. Glad you said that. That's a good point. Sometimes this is what Michelle says. I finally confront him after the fifth time of finding it. This is a good example, Michelle. Like, sometimes if somebody keeps doing something over and over, this might be a time where you choose to confront it. This might be one of those times where you choose to do it. But do it smart. Do it in those ways that I said. Like, you might want to say, hey, you know, I found your bottles, or I saw those receipts. And to be honest with you, it's like the fifth time I just wanted you to know. I know. I just wanted you to know. I'm not sneaking. I just found it like. And then just move on casually. You say it quick and you move on. And that's it. And let it. Let it sit and let it simmer. Anthony says, I kind of think with them. Wait, hold on. I kind of think talking with them and get themselves to see the problem, asking a leading question and then listening to the answers. Most people know they have an issue but need to talk the problem out. That's right. Right. That's exactly right. Totally agree. AJ has a question here. He says, amber, does it help. Does it help to video the addict and show them after how their abusive behavior is when he's stoned? He's Dr. Jekyll, Mr. Hyde, two different people. That's a really good question. And I gotta tell you, I don't. Sometimes yes and sometimes no. So the question you wanna ask yourself, aj, is what do you know about this person's personality? Is this the kind of person that if you show them the video, they're going to be irate because they're going to feel embarrassed and their response to feeling embarrassed is going to be to lose their crackers? This is probably not helpful if they have a more sort of milder personality or they can handle it, or they can at least have enough humility. And you can say it with humility. Hey, like, I just wanted you to see this, or just wanted, you know, I saw this and show it to him. It. That can be helpful. I have seen that be somewhat helpful, but I have also seen that backfire. You know what? One of the things that's interesting that's happened, that kind of AJ's question remind me of, is not, I don't think family members should do this, but several times in the office when I've dealt with clients who had like DUIs or something, a lot of times they can get the. The video of their dui. Like, their lawyer gets it. And I've watched with clients their video because a lot of times they're like, I haven't watched yet. I'm nervous. And we'll watch it together. And it's a pretty embarrassing and humiliating thing for someone to watch. So when I've done that, you have to realize it is a horrible moment for someone. Right? And if you're going to show them a video like that, you need to do it with empathy, care, concern and love, not judgment and finger pointing. And see, I told you, you're a hole or whatever. Right? Don't do it that way. So if you are going to do it, do it with love, care and concern and say, you know what? I know that's not you. I know that's not what you want to do. I know that's not how you feel at all. And it hurts my heart to see you like that because I know that's not who you are. That's what I would say if I were going to show on video. So if you're going to do it, think about the personality. Think about, I mean, you know them, can they handle it or not? And then do it with love, care and concern so that they can absorb the information and it's an effective tool, not something that's going to make the whole situation blow up. MSK says I understand the value of letting them see their own problem. However, in reality, it's very hard to maintain calmness when everything feels chaotic. Any, any suggestions? You man, you're 100% right. You're spot on. I usually say this, but I forgot today. And what I'm saying is I know what I'm asking you to do feels like impossible. And sometimes it may be impossible and it's for sure unfair that I'm asking you to keep your calm in a situation that's not a calm situation. Right. The thing that might help you keep your calm is focusing on the big picture. And stop focusing on, they think they're fooling you. Stop focusing on, they think you're an idiot. Stop focusing on your pride. Let your pride go because your pride will lose you this war just like their pride will lose them this war. So you need to let your pride get out of the way so that their pride can get out of the way. Because when your shows up, their shows up. So focusing on winning the war. And for me, I've just been doing this so long that I know, I know I've got a strategy and I know I've got a purpose. And that purpose for me is way more important than every single little battle when I know that's different for me because if it's in your house, it's different. I get that. But focus on the war and not every single little thing. And don't worry about, don't worry about your pride because you're gonna feel proud of yourself when you win this war. Okay, foreign, let's see here. MH says I am sick of coddling self pity selfish people who cry about the consequences of their own action. They blame the very people having to clean up after them for the Sake of the family. You are right. You are right when you say you are tired of coddling selfish behavior. I 100% believe you and I 1000% believe you when you say they blame the very people that are taking up the slack, trying to protect them and trying to protect family. That is exactly what they do. And one good reason to get them to blame another person is to instigate them, is to try and push them. That's a lot of what gets them to blame. I'm telling you, when family members don't do this, these people show up in my office or treatment centers, I just see like this many of them. Right. Most of them show up somewhere else. But I can tell you, the ones that show up in my office, they show up knowing they got a problem and not focusing on the family. It's just so great. Get to the issue like a thousand times faster. Let's see here. Sarah says I put up one boundary. I didn't want to go on dates with him drunk anymore. He flipped out. Gaslighting, hateful, belligerent. It was crazy. I told him sober it wasn't an ultimatum. He thought, cut off. I'm thinking, Sarah. He said he thought it was. Yeah. Sometimes even when you try to be kind, you just, you can say ahead of time, look, I'm just not going to go out on days with you when you're not sober and you can keep that. And that's a healthy boundary. Right. And you don't have to fight like if they, if let's say they're going to take you to eat dinner or whatever, but you've already set this boundary. I'm not going to go out on dates with you when you're drunk and they show up and they're drunk. Be careful here. This is where the confronting the lie may come because you can say, have you been drinking? And they're going to say no. Or they're going to say, well, only had two and you know darn well they had way more than that or whatever. Don't try to get into the argument and confront the details of it. You can say the story. I'm telling myself I could be wrong. This is the way I'm feeling. Maybe I'm just being paranoid, but let's try again tomorrow night. And, and even when you try all those things and you be as kind as you can be about it, the other person may be defensive. And the reason that is is because of all these defense mechanisms trying to protect their self defense against their own shame and guilt and Denial. So sometimes even if you do it right, they still act like jerks. I'm not promising you they won't. I'm just telling you this is the, the best way, the most likely way to not hit the jerk button. But sometimes it still does, and that depends on the person. Sandra said, I had to say I'm afraid of you. It's not good for my sobriety that your lies make me question my reality. I'm doing this program, but I need a break from fighting my fighter nature. I like what you're saying there. When you're in the family member point of view, Sandra, you're right, because it's a lot of withholding. And that's what I think of when I read your statement, when you say fighting my fighting nature. Your nature is to confront something head on, which is not a bad nature, but. But it shouldn't. Regardless of whether it's a substance abuse problem or not, you got to think through any problem in life. Is it. Is this going to help if I confront it head on? Right. Avoiding problems all the time is not good either. Right. So you got to have your middle balance, and it's okay to take a break, back up from the person, get yourself some refuel, and decide whether or not you want to go back in it. It is completely fine to take distance, whether that's a few hours to yourself or a total break from the relationship. Sometimes you need to do that. LW said, I kind of just want vengeance, not a solution. At this point, it's really hard to get back into the space of wanting a solution. Now, I hear you. And what that tells me, lw, is that you really hurt and to the point right now that it feels like, oh, I don't want to get over it. I want them to feel what I feel. If you're dealing with an addict, I know this is probably not what you want to hear, but I promise you they're suffering. And if they don't get that addiction address, they will continue to suffer more and more and more. You won't have to get vengeance. It will be gotten for you, I promise. I know it feels better if we get it, but it will happen. You don't have to do anything. And you definitely don't want to get to the point where you're obsessing about that, because when you do that, you're still letting them run the show and they're still hurting you. So see if you can get some space from it. There are some people in this chat right now and people Watching this video that totally get it. Y', all. Y' all at LW know that you get it, because I know you do. Shannon says, how do you find the ability to sit there when they insist on your excitement for some ridiculous life plan from an adult child? I'm not going to have a phone live in the woods. Like on the kindness of strangers. I struggle to keep my eyes from rolling. It's a phase of recovery, avoiding contact, which isn't healthy. I see what you're saying is, like, how do you avoid. When they say just like ridiculous things or ridiculous life plans, how do you go along with it? That's a tough one. What you can do is you can kind of validate the points in their story that you can agree with. Like. Like, you might could say, you know, I might. I could definitely see the benefits of not being tied to your phone 24 7. You can kind of validate the little points that you can agree with without validating the whole big plan. Or you can say, man, I could definitely see why someone would want to do that. I, you know, I've been the point. I want to run away myself or something like that. But you don't have to agree to the whole plan. So that's what I'll do part of the time. And then I would probably redirect the conversation a little bit because if you know it's triggering, you don't want to subject yourself to that trigger. On and on and on, because eventually it'll get you. All right, everybody, thank you for joining us. Don't forget, in the description is the link to the download for the manipulation. Up next, I'm going to link our manipulation playlist up for you. And if you have a loved one that is struggling and you want to get them out of denial and you want some more effective techniques that than arguing and power struggling, then check out our invisible intervention. I will see everybody next Thursday. We are live at one every week and we also release a new recorded video every Tuesday. See you soon. Bye. Bye.